Nasim Sdn Bhd, the official distributor for the Peugeot brand in Malaysia, have just launched the New Peugeot 3008 SUV Plus and New Peugeot 5008 SUV Plus. These are Peugeot's refresh of the two locally assembled SUVs and they are the culmination of a joint agreement in 2018 between Naza Group and Groupe PSA to establish Naza Automotive Manufacturing (NAM) as the Southeast Asia hub where they

It must be Peugeot week here. The official distributor for Peugeot automobiles in Malaysia, Nasim Sdn Bhd has launched the facelifted Peugeot 508 and I was there. The new 508 gets quite a major front end revamp. There is a new family grille with new bumper design and a redesigned bonnet too. There are also full LED technology in the car now. Headlights (which also swivel according to steering angle) are LED as are the daytime running lights, fog lamps and rear lights too. The rear bumper also has a redesign also.

The interior gets a 7 inch multimedia display and is fully loaded with audio, reverse camera, driving aids, connectivity and navigation. A whole lot of stuff as well as JBL speakers (which do sound good as I managed to sit in a display unit and cranked it up a fair bit). Aside from the above, you also get every other goodie you can think of. safety systems, keyless entry, push start, electric parking brake, electrically adjustable seats and other stuff too.


The Peugeot 508 comes sedan and SW (station wagon) models with two engines - the 1.6THP with its 1.6liter turbocharged high pressure turbocharger (THP) that has 165ps and 240nm torque and the 2.2 turbodiesel with 206ps and 450Nm torque. Both get the 6 speed automatic gearbox that as adaptive learning with tiptronic and sport modes for those that want more interaction. You get a 0-100kmh time of 9.2secs and 220kmh max speed with the THP and a 0-100kmh time of 8.4secs and 235kmh in the oil burner. Prices are estimated to start at RM175,000 for the 1.6THP to around RM205,000 for the 508 GT SW. A lot of performance and equipment for the price.

I have to say that Peugeot have revamped the 508 and made it better looking. There are still certain idiosyncrasies that are prevalent in this Peugeot as in other Peugeots. Call it typically French - like the smallish glovebox and no proper place to put your larger smartphones. But this is still just a facelift, and not a total model change. But that being said, the Peugeot 508 is one of the better options to get in terms of how unique it stands out of the crowd of slightly mundane Japanese D segment cars as well as how the car would handle compared to the Japanese too. I mean, you don't win many Car of the Year awards if it wasn't good you know.

Nasim informed us that they hope to be able to sell between 70-90 units of the new 508 monthly. They also stated, quite surprisingly that the 508 is actually their second best selling car in Malaysia behind the 208. This is 16% of the total sales and will contribute to the 6,000 units sales target for 2015. Another bit of trivia is that Peugeot sales in Malaysia account for 71.4% of all Peugeot sales in the ASEAN region. We do love our Peugeots.

Car manufacturers are chasing the bottom-line these days. It is all about profits and staying in the black rather than in the red. This is obviously good business practise as who the heck goes into business to lose money. And because of this we have Mitsubishi deciding to soldier on with the Lancer for a good while longer and companies like Peugeot deciding to cut its current range of 26 cars to a slender 13. Cost cutting really rears its head here.



We're going to see cars like the 108, 208, 308, 408 and the 508 as well as the crossovers and people carriers. Sadly we're not going to see a new RCZ. Peugeot head honcho Maxime Picat told Autocar recently that  they're not going to replace that stunning return to form coupe.

"I love the RCZ, but I want us to focus on making the best of our core models, from Peugeot 108 upwards, and to exploit what we then have to the best of our abilities. For each of those cars we can choose attributes and be the best. Chasing niches is for premium brands; for us it has been a distraction.” said Picat.


Now aside from its seriously good looks for a small and relatively affordable coupe this car is fun to drive (in the 190hp manual form and not the 156hp automatic version - which needs the extra horses to go wild). It has really been awhile that a Peugeot has been true to its roots. These days their cars do not actually glide over bumps and potholes nor do many of their warmer hatches actually like cocking up a rear wheel in anger. Let's just hope the RCZ stays in production awhile longer. Let's also hope that manufacturers go crazy once in awhile too.

Hello folks. Welcome to the first post of 2015. Yes, yes I have been busy doing nothing much in terms of writing over the past month or so. The reason being the recent school holidays and that I was just plain lazy. It takes a whole lot of effort on my part to actually sit down and type something out as you all would agree that thumb twiddling, latte drinking, shopping, meeting up with friends and other non-productive things to do are so much fun. And when you actually add the fact that keeping this website up to date does not actually pay me a whole bunch of Ringgit every month you can see why I have neglected posting anything over the last thirty days or so. So let's start 2015 with an introduction of why motoring-malaysia.blogspot.com actually started in the first place.


Now way back in 2005-2006 or so I was intrigued with editorials and articles written by great British automotive journos like Clarkson, Setright, May and a few others including those who had written for EVO magazine like a certain Mr Chris Harris. I basically thought to myself and asked "How hard can it be?"

It wasn't so hard at all in the end as whilst working for a friend/boss/ partner I had the means to do so. So write I did. A couple of years after that I was good enough to write for a handful of websites, notably the Singapore based myautoblog.org (under the SGcarmart group) and now the hugely popular Carthrottle.com (wrote for them for a while and had to stop as they were catering for the younger and more Eurocentric/American type of crowd). I also managed to ghost write for a number of websites, which I do not want to mention here as some were start-ups and have ceased to exist. Oh well, the writing did pay some bills and opened doors.

And then,  my time for writing for the websites mentioned above came to an end. I then decided to put a little more effort into motoring-malaysia and see what can be done. I suppose I did okay as I somehow managed to gain some recognition locally by winning a 'Best Auto Blog' award at the Malaysian Social Media Awards 2014. I could have done better, but what this meant was for less 'Me Time' and more writing and slogging. Those that personally know me would tell you folks out there that it would be unbecoming of me to have less personal time than anything else. Yup. I suppose I am one of those dignified thumb twiddlers out there and I can afford not concentrating my efforts here. There are my other business pursuits I have to handle to you know...but last December was just a plain ol' break away from writing as it does takes its toll.

Anyway, luckily for me (but not you readers) I can afford to take a break. Actually, it is the fact that I can afford to take a break that some of the stuff published here can be a little bit spicy to some. The amount of brickbats, complaints about me trashing some of the cars by unsatisfied owners and even by some manufacturers is a lot. The cake has to be the PR people at Nissan (not naming names of course) who called me asking me why I called one of their cars a venereal disease. Of course, I don't get invited to any Nissan events. But life goes on. It's not as if I cannot get my hands on any Nissan if I wanted to. But at this moment, aside from the GTR, the local crop of Nissans are extremely dull and uncle-like. Oh, at 42, I am uncle of age too, but my attitude is far from it. And I do believe that since the Teana is no longer equipped with a V6 locally, they don't really interest me as much as before.

So let me now relate a car test drive experience to you folks out there. I think starting off 2015 with a review of a sports car is a nice thing. I remember driving a Peugeot RCZ a couple of years ago and while the drive was a memorable one (and the fact that I took notes after the drive), I have not written about it.


First launched in 2009 the Peugeot RCZ is a beautiful creature. This was a car that actually made it in its entirety from motorshow concept car to production model without any major changes. The only major change in the exterior was the exhausts were positioned to the left of the car from the middle. Peugeot even kept the Zagato-like double bubble roof which actually makes the car super exotic looking. When I first saw one on the road in 2010 it was like looking at something that costed a million Ringgit. It was stunning. It had curves in all the right places. I was actually quite keen in procuring one for myself in 2012 if not for the fact and more logical reasoning that I needed a proper luxury sedan to ferry my family around.

Anyway, it did not stop me from actually taking a drive in one to satisfy my curiosity and whether there was a chance in hell it could be a family car. It could. If you didn't really car whether your then eight year old daughter and 68 year old mother could fit in the rear. There are rear seats, the kid might fit, but there could be some issues if my mother were to come along for our jaunts to Penang or Singapore.

But of course there is bound to be issues with the RCZ. It is a sports car. One that had actually won quite a number of awards from publications like Top Gear and Auto Express. It is beautiful to look at and while it may only be a Peugeot which some brand snobs turn their nose away from I have to state that snobs should actually drive the car before deciding so.

The RCZ I drove was a 1.6liter turbocharged 6 speed automatic (THP156). This means that it has 156hp instead of the 200hp in the THP200 6 speed manual. Torque of the automatic is 240Nm over 275Nm of the manual. This translates to a leisurely 0-100km/h time of 8.4secs (7.5secs manual) and a top speed of 212kmh. But I have to say that in a purpose built sports car, it isn't all about the figures but how the car makes you feel. And the Peugeot RCZ does make you feel like you're driving something exotic from the way it looks.


Now while the exterior looks like a million Ringgit, the actual platform used by the RCZ is based on the Peugeot 308 that we see on the roads of Malaysia. You do sit lower in the RCZ than the bulbous 308 and you also see the familiar 308 dashboard in a lower setting with a clock in place of the middle air vent. The dials have more trimming on them too. You do get leatherette wrap for the whole dashboard making the interior look more upmarket than it really is. But those who actually own a 308 would feel that it is quite similar to one on the inside.

As for driving the RCZ I have to state that the chassis is remarkable but if you want to let it work hard then you have to stay away from the lowly powered RCZ automatic. The car on its standard 19inch wheels sticks to the road so much and you have to be really stupid to unstick it. It is front wheel driven and it will change direction pretty quickly. Overall feel is that the RCZ automatic is much more planted, secure than the entry level front wheel drive Audi TT Mk2 2.0TFSI. Now while the TT driver will have more power to lay down, the RCZ could make up by being more surefooted in and around the bends. Somehow, a stock TT rolls more and is more twitchy at higher speeds than this. For the average driver, the RCZ is more confidence inspiring and I also remembered that the THP200 could actually do a better lap time than the TT when tested by EVO magazine UK.

So do not judge a Pug by it merely looking good. It is a bloody good driver's car too in manual form. Here in automatic, it merely looks its part, does high speed cruising well but don't go chasing Golf GTIs in one folks. Buy it to look good. And sometime in 2013, Peugeot had reworked its nose and it isn't so smiley these days. Still a looker though.

The RCZ costs over RM248,000 new these days. Used ones go for between RM135,000-158,000. They are not that troublesome to maintain as they are mechanically similar to the 308 Turbo. What you need to do is ensure you use a thicker grade of oil -w40 INSTEAD of the recommended w30, service regularly, ensure you use good petrol and occasionally use fuel additives. You'll want good oil to keep the turbo lubricated but not thin until it cannot stand our Malaysian climate and use better quality fuel (Caltex and BHP comes to mind) so that no excessive dirt ruins the turbo. This is a bugbear of the 1.6liter Peugeot engine. But hey, if the car looks this good, Spend abit more on it.

A five year old budget car should be a reasonable used car purchase. The reason being that most Malaysians rake up about 25,000km per year and at about five years old, 125,000km later it still has a good 100,000km before things start going wrong. If the car hasn't been neglected by its previous owner that is. . So at around 100,000km, most would only require a timing belt change (if required), an oil change for the transmission and engine as well as some secondary belting for the car. So what can we buy cheaply and that isn't a Perodua Viva sized car.



Now a Viva is in the same price range used, but if you're buying used, buy something with a little more comfort. A Viva is a city car and its tiny. It is narrow and you put two fat people side by side inside one and it'll look like something from a circus. So I looked through the classifieds and I've narrowed it down to the second generation pre-facelift Proton Saga.

With around RM16,000-17,000 you can go hunting for either a 1.3 manual, automatic or if  you're lucky a  1.6 with either transmission. It's simple really. The car has four doors and a boot. It isn't cramped as a Viva and it rides well too. The steering may be slow and the handling slightly stoid. It also looks dumpy (slightly made better with the facelifted Saga FL which you would not get at this price range) but then again, cheap almost never equals to cheery.

So you're left with dumpy and driveable. Don't expect it to look like a Subaru Impreza (but that does not stop most people from trying to make a Saga into one) or don't expect it to drive like even a Proton Satria Neo. But if it's transport you're looking for on the cheap and one that is also cheapest to maintain (cheap spares). This car is it.

Notable mentions would be a slightly older second generation Hyundai Accent (you know, the one with fake scoops everywhere) and the Naza/Peugeot 206 Bestari. Both can be had for a tad under RM19,000 for a '09 model but both costs slightly more to maintain.

 The Hyundai may offer better proportions as well as Hyundai built quality. Its spare parts may be bought cheaper than what you think it costs IF you ignore the spare parts shops and head straight to Hyundai Malaysia. But you could have this Hyundai in a bodykit if you look hard enough. Of course, this is just cosmetic. I've seen some with the bodykit with Subaru badges on it too. Oh what deluded minds Malaysians have. These people have no idea that this lowly Accent campaigned in the World Rally Championship in 1990-2003 with drivers like former Group A champion Kenneth Eriksson and British Rally Champion Alister McRae (brother of the late, great Colin McRae). All these guys had to do was make a rally replica of a HYUNDAI ACCENT....and not a replica of a Subaru Impreza. Duh.


The Pug 206 is good, but spares will cost more. It's a Conti. A flaky French one too. Whaddya expect? Even servicing the air-conditioning components require a dashboard out job making labour a little bit more costly. Aside from that, it drives well, handles great and looks quite good too. I suppose this is because it is a Peugeot. Oh, and its the most cheery car of the lot at this price range.

There you go. Some help in choosing cheap transport.

Busy. This is a nice excuse to give everyone that you're just too lazy to start typing something. But I actually have been a little busy with family, work and friends. Work for MyAutoBlog is ongoing but other stuff has slowed down a little. It is Idul Adha anyway and I should be taking a breather from things.

Now that being said, I have prepared a short list of what I think about a few of the cars currently on sale in Malaysia (grey imports not included)
Toyota:
Camry - Ultimate Unclemobile, it makes me sleepy as soon as I enter one
Corolla Altis - Smaller Unclemobile, same effects happen as soon as I get into one.
Vios - Dull, tinny sounding and I rather drive an Inspira
Prius - Unclemobile that's trying to save the world.

Honda:
Accord - Unclemobile with handling
Civic - Decent Transport with a badge that Malaysians like
City - Skinny tall car with a badge that Malaysians like
Insight - Better looking than the Prius, but not as well built. I still won't buy it though.
CRZ - Hybrid little coupe for posers, mums, wives, girlfriends, daughters. Not a "Tap-R."

Lancer GT -  A car all Inspira owners yearn for
Lancer Sportback - A car that looks good but no one buys it because Proton might make one and cause its resale value to drop drastically
ASX - a toad of a car..why buy one when a Sportback looks and drives better?

Peugeot
308VTI -dull handling, heavy, underpowered French croissant
308turbo - dullhandling, heavy, better powered French croissant
3008 - Hippotamus on wheels, enuff said.
207 Sedan - Ugliest car in Malaysia. Why buy it over an Inspira? The Badge? You stupid, stupid person you.

Volvo
All Volvos - For Life. This means you only buy one throughout your whole life.

I think I'll end it for now. I've got to be someplace elsewhere soon.